Be A Better Cook With These Useful Tips!

Be A Better Cook - How many times have you dreaded going into the kitchen to make breakfast, lunch, or dinner? You might need a new perspective. Cooking can be enjoyable and relaxing if you try to see it in another way. Here are a few cooking tips that are sure to get your taste buds tingling and entice your inner chef to come out.

For stir-fry dishes, meat should be sliced very thinly and on the bias. Perfectly sliced meat takes time and patience, though. Take the meat out of the freezer once it firms up (not frozen) then cut at an angle of 45 degrees across the grainy part of the meat.

Do not keep your herbs or spices in a place that is not cool and dark. Storing them out exposes them to light, excessive heat and humidity, which can reduce their shelf life. Spices last longer and taste better when stored in cool, dark locations. Fresh spices offer better taste profiles than stale ones.

If you are cooking and you need to add some oil to the pan, drip it down the inside so that it will be a little warm when it hits the food. This will help keep the foods flavor locked in and make for a tasty meal.

You may have felt regret when you threw away a moldy orange or lemon. Have you ever wondered if you could simply cut away the part with mold and keep the rest? Unfortunately, you cannot rescue a piece of fruit once it has started to grow moldy and decayed. Discard the fruit, because the mold penetrated deeper than can be seen with the naked eye, and moldy foods can cause some people to experience health problems.

Let raw potatoes soak in some cold water for a half hour prior to frying them to increase the crispiness of French fries. Letting sliced potatoes soak up additional cold fluids reinforces the fibers in the vegetable, so that when you deep fry them, they can better withstand the heat without breaking down completely.

By doing any prep work the day before a big meal, you can make the actual cooking process faster and less stressful. Examine recipes and identify which preparations can take place well in advance without risking spoilage. There are many recipes where you can do the prep work the day before you start cooking. This can turn even the most complex recipes into quick, fun and fast cooking jobs.

Incorporate the preceding tips into your meal preparation. After your first taste, you will realize that cooking is not such a bad thing after all! You should look forward to this, as you may find yourself trying so many dishes and recipes. Try out some new cooking techniques and start enjoying the process!